Most professors I've known more closely seem to be workaholics with bad work-life balance and this is actually the main reason I don't want to go into academia.
Hypotheses: 1) the distribution is long-tailed and my samples are only from "good" universities, or 2) the tenure-track process selects for hard workers anyway
Maybe it's just that
None of them earns as much as a billionaire's child earns just by having parents who gave them a trust fund.
This site does not whine when someone like Maciej Ceglowski creates a "lifestyle business" that only takes 10 hours or so a week, but it whines when people unionize or climb the academic ladder to get good working condition.
(In reality, everyone is motivated by the pursuit of knowledge, and maybe a little by the pursuit of fame, including underpaid grad students, and tenured professors, and even the actual retirees (emeritus professors) who often keep working.)
Granted, I worked in STEM fields. Maybe this author does not realize what it is like in the physical sciences or engineering?
But, I think most people do. The system is deliberately designed to push an assistant professor so hard, that when they get a permanent contract, they're conditioned to keep pushing. It typically succeeds.
Like everyone else, I have always had the pleasure of being at a top-20 school (in some list or the other!). Fortunately, I think this article is only attacking tenure at schools rated lower. (Let me know if I misinterpreted the article.)
We could eliminate tenure at lower-ranked schools. I'm not sure who will teach there if we do. The 90th percentile salary for a new tenure-track professor is 145K (https://cra.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/2023-CRA-Taulbee-... page 49). Nobody competent is going to take that salary without the possibility of tenure.
qwe----3•1h ago